Etymologically
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segmentation

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Pronunciation

  • /ˌseɡmenˈteɪʃ(ə)n/, /ˌseɡmənˈteɪʃ(ə)n/[1]

Etymology

It is formed from English segment + -ation.[2][3][4][5][6] The verb comes from the noun,[5][2] which is from Latin segmentum (“a strip or piece cut off”), from secō (“to cut”), with -c- changed to -g- before -m-,[5][2] from Proto-Indo-European *sek- (“to cut”).[5] The OED records the noun segmentation (1851) a few years before the verb (1859).[2][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Blount's glossary (1656) gives an earlier segmentation, "a cutting into small pieces", which is otherwise unrecorded and now obsolete.[2][5] The modern word appears in 1851, in W. B. Carpenter's Manual of Physiology, for division into segments, especially the division of an egg cell in an embryo.[2][3]

Semantic evolution

The word began as a term of embryology, for the way a single cell divides into many,[2][3][5] and in zoology it was also used for the division of a body into a series of similar segments.[4][7] The Historical Thesaurus files the 1851 sense both under embryo development and under the general division of a whole into parts.[8] In physiology it names a ring-shaped contraction of smooth muscle, as in the intestine.[3] Marketing took it up in 1956 for dividing a market into groups of customers.[2][8]

Timeline

  • 1656 – a cutting into small pieces, in Blount (now obsolete).[2][5]
  • 1851 – division into segments, especially the division of an egg cell in an embryo.[2][3][5]
  • 1956 – marketing, the division of a market into segments.[2][8]

Meanings

Noun

  1. The act or process of dividing something into segments, or the state of being divided: the segmentation of the text into sentences.[7][3][4]
  2. (embryology) The division of a fertilized egg into many cells; cleavage.[7][3][2]
  3. (zoology) Division of the body into a series of similar parts; metamerism.[7][4]
  4. (physiology) A ring-shaped contraction of smooth muscle, as in the intestine.[3]
  5. (marketing) The division of a market into groups of customers with shared needs.[2]

Word family

  • nonsegmentation

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
  7. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
  8. ^ a b c Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)